Secrets About Life Every Woman Should Know: Ten principles for spiritual and emotional fulfillment

All of us spend our time here on earth searching for happiness, longing to discover the secrets for living a fulfilled and peaceful life. From our very first moments of existence as an infant until the day we die, we are motivated by the search for what we believe will make us happy:

“I want to be fed … I want to be held … I want to crawl over and look in that cabinet … I want that toy … I want to go to the amusement park … I want to stay up and watch TV … I want to get on the cheerleading squad … I want those kids to like me … I want that guy to be my boyfriend … I want to go to the mall and buy that outfit … I want to get into a good college … I want to lose these extra ten pounds …”

“I want him to ask me to marry him … I want to have a fancy wedding … I want to find the perfect apartment … I want to find the perfect job … I want to get pregnant … I want my husband to be more intimate … I want to find a career that leaves me time for my children … I want to move into a bigger house … I want the kids to do well in school…”

“I want to have sex with my husband more often … I want the kids to go to college … I want my daughter to marry a nice boy … I want my son to stay in the family business … I want to take that trip to Europe we’ve always talked about … I want the kids to live close enough so we can visit the grandchildren often …”

“I want my husband to take better care of himself … I want to buy a condo in Florida for when we retire … I want to be well enough to attend my granddaughter’s graduation … I want our investments to do well so I have enough money to live on if my husband passes away before me … I want to be able to have enough strength today to take a little walk … I want to see the ocean once more before I die …”

These are all lovely things to wish for. There is nothing wrong with these desires, or with the list you could write of what you believe would make you happy. But what happens inside of you when the things on your list don’t come true? What happens in your heart when what you hope for in life doesn’t happen?

You and I both know the answer to these questions: When we don’t get what we want, we suffer. We feel disappointed, or angry, or hurt, or anxious, or insecure, or confused, or betrayed, and definitely not happy. We have our list of expectations about life, about love, and we decide we are happy or not from moment to moment based on how many of those expectations are being met and how many are not.

We go through this silent but deadly process of evaluating our happiness hundreds of times a day, perhaps dozens of times before we even leave the house in the morning. For instance:

Your alarm goes off and you are awakened from sleep. Another day has begun. So far, the day is neutral, neither a good day nor a bad day—just a blank slate. You open one eye to glance over at the window and see what the weather is like. It’s raining. “Darn,” you think. “Traffic is going to be terrible.” This is your first thought of the day. You have already decided that you aren’t happy about something—the weather has not met your expectations and thus has disappointed you.

You roll out of bed and shuffle into the kitchen for your morning cup of coffee. Then you notice that your husband forgot to turn the automatic coffee machine on the night before, so there’s no coffee ready. You sigh with annoyance. Expectation number two has not been met. You hear the kids stirring in their rooms, then determine that they are squabbling over who will use the bathroom first. Sigh again, this time with more irritation. “Hey, cut it out kids—you only have a half hour to get dressed and eat before the bus comes, so move it!” Good-bye to expectation number three, that your kids will calmly and quietly get ready for school without creating a fuss.

Back to your bedroom. Your husband is at the sink brushing his teeth. “Good morning, honey,” you say cheerfully, kissing him on the cheek. “Morning,” he mumbles back distractedly. You feel a painful tug in your heart, wishing he had greeted you with more affection, and as you wonder if something’s wrong between you, your sense of well-being shrinks some more. You shower and dress. As you pull on your pants you notice that they seem tighter than you remember. “Oh no, I have gained a few pounds again,” you lament. Another expectation crashes down as it collides with reality. It hasn’t even been an hour since you woke, and already you have collected enough evidence to make yourself feel some degree of discontent and unhappiness.

I am sure you have your own version of this scenario, your own list of unmet expectations which build up during a typical day or a typical week and put you into a less than happy state of mind. You think: “If these things occur, I’ll feel happy. But if these other things occur, I will feel unhappy.” I know I have an unconscious list like this; most people do.

The problem with these lists of expectations is that they set us up for inevitable disappointment. Why?Because life is unpredictable. No matter how hard we try to control people and events and circumstances, we fail. People don’t behave as we want them to. Circumstances change that we’d hoped would stay the same. Events occur that are not in our control. As I wrote in the introduction, our spinning plates drop. Or, as a popular bumper sticker says, “Shit happens.” And we all know it does.

What I’ve been describing is probably the most fundamental way you may be sabotaging your happiness in this life:

When you go through each day expecting what is happening outside of yourself to make you happy, you are setting yourself up for failure. You are setting yourself up for misery. You make yourself a victim of circumstances you cannot control and become dependent upon others for your own state of joy and contentment.

Why is basing your happiness on what’s happening in your outer life such a spiritual and emotional dead end? Because, ironically, when you count on the events of your outer life to make you happy, you are trying to create stability by clinging to that which is always changing! By nature, everything in life is in constant motion. Nothing stays the same for long. So hoping to create peace and tranquility by getting everything in your life to fall perfectly into place is as futile as jumping into a turbulent ocean and somehow hoping you will stay still.

The ancient scriptures of many religions have pointed out this dilemma for thousands of years: All pain and suffering comes from attachment to that which is inevitably always changing. When we spend our time and energy trying to get it all perfect on the outside, we are focusing our attention in the wrong direction.

So if what’s outside is always changing, if your plates are always going to drop, if some of your expectations are always going to be disappointed, how can you create a sense of happiness and contentment in life? The answer is to go in the opposite direction from the one we’re used to going in, to make a shift from trying to create stability on the outside to creating it on the inside.

This is the first secret about life I want to share with you:

SECRET NUMBER ONE:

EVERYTHING YOU NEED

TO BE HAPPY IS INSIDE OF YOU

What does this statement actually mean? It means that you already have the key to your own happiness inside of you. It’s your own inner state that determines whether or not you’re happy, and not what happens to you on the outside. Maybe you didn’t realize that, but it’s true. And you’re already experiencing this amazing phenomenon every day.

Think back to a time in your life when you were doing something that “should” have made you happy, such as going out to eat at a wonderful restaurant, or attending a concert you’d been waiting to see, or traveling to an exciting vacation spot you’d looked forward to visiting, BUT … you couldn’t enjoy what you were doing on the outside because you were feeling terrible on the inside. Maybe you were sitting all dressed up at the fabulous restaurant, but knew that someone you loved, such as one of your children or a family member, was ill, so you just couldn’t enjoy the food or the atmosphere. Maybe you were in the audience at the concert you’d been waiting months to attend, but you just had a terrible day at work and were so angry about a situation there that you couldn’t get excited about the show at all. Or maybe you were on an exotic vacation with your partner in one of the most beautiful places in the world, but he was being very cold, distant, and unromantic with you, and you felt so hurt that it didn’t matter where you were.

What was making you unhappy in these situations? The restaurant? The concert? Being on vacation? No … in fact, these are the very things you thought would make you happy.

You know just how this works. It always starts with a simple desire: “If I could just take a few weeks and go to Hawaii, I’d be so happy,” you tell yourself. And you finally decide to do it. And you announce to all your friends that you are going, and you can’t wait. And you think about it for months. “Only three more weeks, and we’ll be in Hawaii!” “Only one more week, and I’ll be lying on the beach drinking a piña colada!” Then finally you’re there, and your husband isn’t paying much attention to you, and you’re feeling unloved, and you’re lying on the beach feeling absolutely miserable. And suddenly, the same things that were supposed to make you happy are driving you crazy: it’s too hot and the couple in the adjacent lounge chair is bugging you and you can’t stand the hotel and you’re having a crummy time and wish you’d never come in the first place.

Why isn’t Hawaii making you happy when you were so sure it would? Because Hawaii doesn’t have the power to make you happy. If it did, you’d be lying there thinking, “To hell with the fact that my husband is acting like a slug—I’m in Hawaii!! Who cares if my marriage is on the rocks? Look at those gorgeous palm trees!! Gosh, I’m happy!”

Hasn’t this happened to you? Haven’t you finally gone somewhere or done something you thought would make you feel wonderful, only it doesn’t, and you wonder to yourself, “Gee, I paid a lot of money for this. I should be enjoying it. I should be having a good time. What’s wrong?”

What’s wrong is that nothing on the outside is ever going to be more powerful than your own inner state of consciousness. You could be in the most beautiful spot on the planet, but if your heart is hurting, or your mind is anxious, you’ll be miserable. And the opposite is true as well—you could be in the most unappealing place, but if your inner state is joyous and contented, you will feel happy where you are. You will create your own paradise.

Living Life from the Inside Out

This is an amazing and radical revelation about one of the secrets of life:

Life happens from the inside out. If you are happy, it is because of what is going on inside of you. If you are sad, it is because of what is going on inside of you. Your world is all happening inside of you.

The world itself is a neutral place. Nothing that happens to you is inherently positive or negative. It is your interpretation of it that makes it a positive or negative experience. It is what you do with it inside yourself that makes it positive or negative. In fact, nothing really happens to your true self on the outside. All of your reactions to life take place on the inside. That’s why, whether you have understood it this way or not, you are already living life from the inside out.

Here are some examples of this principle:

Let’s say you are in a relationship with a man. He comes to you one day and announces, “I don’t want to be with you anymore. I am leaving.” Is his leaving you a positive or negative event? The answer is: It is neither. His leaving is neutral. It is just an action. He is walking out. What is positive or negative is how you react inside to his leaving. If you are madly in love with him and think you are meant to be together, you will react with sorrow and conclude that his leaving is negative. If you were tired of him anyway, and trying to figure out a way to break it off yourself, you will react with relief, and conclude that his leaving is positive. Do you see how the same event can be experienced as producing happiness or sadness when in fact, the event isn’t doing anything—it’s your inner state that is producing those emotions, those reactions?

Here’s another example: You are in a car accident and are seriously injured. You end up having to take a month off from work to stay at home and recover, and your mother, with whom you don’t get along very well, comes to stay and take care of you. “This one is definitely not neutral!” you may be thinking. But look more closely. If you focus on how awful it is that you had the accident, that you are missing work, and that you have to put up with your mother, you will be unhappy and conclude that the accident was a negative event. But what if you take that time to contemplate your life and how fast you’ve been moving, and see that this month was a “forced vacation,” so to speak, in which some higher power is insisting you slow down? And what if you realize that your mother is again able to feel useful in caring for you, in a way she hasn’t for years, and that you are able to receive her love in this form, which is a great gift to her? And what if you allow yourself to feel vulnerable and out of control for the first time in a long while, and notice the harshness of your hard-driving personality softening in a way that is undeniably healthy? Then, in spite of your injury, you might feel a deep sense of well-being, and conclude that the accident was a very positive and, indeed, even necessary event.

Happiness is a decision you make to experience a situation in a particular way. It is not something that is bestowed upon you from the outside. It comes from the inside out. In the same way, unhappiness isn’t something that is inflicted upon you from the outside—it, too, is a choice you make.

You are the person with the most power to affect your life. You are the one who decides to be happy or unhappy about what you are experiencing.

Isn’t this a mind-bending discovery? Isn’t this great news? The happiness you have been looking for is available at any time! It is right here, right now. You have been waiting for something on the outside to trigger your happiness, so you could give yourself permission to experience it, but the ability to be happy has been inside you all along. In fact, happiness can only be attained from within.

Nothing can make you happy without your permission.

Nothing can make you unhappy without your permission.

This is the meaning of Secret Number One: Everything You Need to Be Happy Is Inside of You—that you already possess the power to decide to be happy or unhappy. In this way, you create your own heaven or your own hell, your own contentment or your own misery, from moment to moment.

Understanding this principle is the first step in becoming emotionally and spiritually free, because you begin to see that what you feel and experience at any time is ultimately up to you. This kind of freedom isn’t something anyone else can give you—it’s the freedom only you can bestow on yourself by living each day from the inside out. Then you start to have true control over your life and your destiny, not by trying to make everything perfect on the outside, but by learning how to tap into your own source of happiness and peace on the inside.

Who Robs You of Your Ecstasy?

One of the reasons I made a serious commitment to my spiritual growth when I was still a teenager was that I was fed up with watching my state of well-being go up and down, up and down, depending upon what was happening in my life. No wonder I was so miserable—I felt like a boat without an anchor, or even a rudder, being tossed around by the stormy seas of circumstance. By the time I turned eighteen, I began formally practicing meditation, and I have continued this and other spiritual disciplines for the past thirty years. And at a certain point after I reached the age of forty-five, I thought I’d achieved a pretty steady state of consciousness. I was spending each summer on a spiritual retreat, where I would dive deep into my own inner silence and experience great tranquillity and contentment.

It was following a summer like this several years ago when suddenly, out of the blue, my life was bombarded by one painful challenge after another, professionally, personally, financially, you name it. It all seemed to hit me at once, like a cosmic hurricane, and no area of my world was left untouched. I remember waking up each morning, my stomach in knots, my heart hurting, not wanting to get out of bed, and thinking, “What happened? Everything was going so well. Where did my peace of mind go?”

In this state of emotional panic, I called someone very dear to me who is a female monk and meditation teacher. Tears fell from my eyes as I listed all of my personal dramas, tragedies, and dilemmas, each one sounding worse than the one before. She patiently and silently listened on the other end of the phone, and when I was finished, there was a long pause in the conversation. Then, in a very gentle but strong voice she said, “Barbara, who is robbing you of your ecstasy?”

“Finally,” I thought to myself, “someone who understands what a terrible time I am going through!” and I began reciting names as an answer to her question: “This person is doing this to me, and this business associate did this to me, and this situation is doing this to me.…”

Again, and more firmly, she asked: “But Barbara, who is robbing you of your ecstasy?”

Suddenly, I felt as if someone had just thrown a bucket of cold water on my face and woken me up from a deep sleep. “Who is robbing you of your ecstasy?” All at once, I realized the profound truth that lay hidden in what she was asking. I did know how to contact my own happiness, my own ecstasy. Just a few months before, this woman had seen me in such a high, peaceful state, a state based on my own inner joy. Then I’d returned home to a turbulent time in my life, and had allowed people and circumstances to rob me of that experience. In fact, no one was really doing anything to me—I was doing it to myself by deciding that I couldn’t be happy anymore if I had these problems or these situations. I was the cause of my own pain. I was robbing myself of my own ecstasy.